Damascius Tweets (2)

[endymions_bower]

Here's the next two days of Damascius tweets.

 

2/16

To Damascius! I'm starting today from p. 74 in Rappe, CW I 11f.

Finding odd Rappe's title for this chapter: "That the One is Unknowable"; chapter is about D.'s "Ineffable".

"If the Ineffable … is in fact nothing from among all things, not even the One itself…" (74/11.22-12.1).

I believe that one of Damascius' goals is to render the One no longer interesting to monotheists.

"If we say that it [the Ineffable] is unknowable, then we are not saying … that it is inherently unknowable by means of a substantial or

ordinary intellection, as in the case of the One, but rather as providing no occasion … even to suspect its existence … it is not even

something that is, nor is it One, nor is it all things, nor is it the principle of all things, nor is it beyond all things… " (75/13).

Damascius makes much use in this section (CW I 15-21) of the eidetic of nonbeing from Plato's Sophist 238e-239a.

We are "persuaded" (peithometha; root of pistis, "belief", "faith") of the nonbeing of the Ineffable…

… but this is merely our "experience" (pathê, "passive", "passion") of it (CW I 16), i.e., not a qualification of it.

Important to understand here, it's not SOMETHING we have an inadequate experience of; IS our sense of some ineffable we inadequately grasp

(Insofar as we may attribute any quality to it at all; but it is to this ersatz procession of the Ineffable D. turns in this section.)

D.'s turn to a positive account of the Ineffable turns on treating "unknowable/knowable" as a pair of relative predicates like great/small

(I'm on p. 78f in Rappe, CW I 17.9ff) Treating the Ineffable's unknowability in this way means that the Ineffable is virtually present

throughout being, "according to which there is something ineffable in each thing" as well as "a kind of order of ineffability" (84/CW 25)

"Divine cognition" which is "unitary (NOT as in Rappe 'unified') and supra-essential … applies itself to the One," (79/CW 19)

Hence the Ineffable is "unknowable even by divine knowledge". D.'s Ineffable hence the ultimate guarantor of henadic nonidentity.

Each God's opacity to self and to one another, which is passed on through their agency, all the way down the procession of being

The God, D. explains is not joined [sunaphthêsetai/Rappe 'united'] with the One "dualistically", as knower with known (CW 19f).

A fortiori, then, the God does not know the Ineffable; the One, thus, is the henad's self-identity, the Ineffable its nonidentity.

Neither the Ineffable nor the One is something other than the henads.

"And thus we shall postulate three monads and three numbers [manifolds] … the substantial, the unitary, and the Ineffable," (84/CW 25).

That is, there are three processions, in ascending order: of beings, of individuals, of nonidentity.

"… nor is each God ineffable before it is one, in the way that [each] is one before <having an> essential <nature>" (<> Rappe's clutter)

Each God is "one", unique, before having an essence (shareable/iterable traits) but the Ineffable is not like this—nor is it one-before-many

3/3

Time to get back to Damascius. Sorry I've lapsed in this; I wanted to read ahead a bit, in order to get a better grasp on the structure.

For those following along, I'm at Rappe's Section II, p. 85ff (Combès & Westerink I 27ff).

This section consists of some ascents to the first principle by different procedures. In general, D. privileges procedures over structure

My theory is that this is due to the aporetic of the first principle that extends through every plane of being, rendering structures fluid

I think that it might be better to regard D.'s "Ineffable" as an ongoing aporetic of the first principle, rather than a new first principle

There may be immediate relation between presence of the "Ineffable" and the change in the status of measurement (the "Mixed" of Philebus)

For unfamiliar, the Promethean method from the Philebus (16c & sqq.) yields a general structure for transition from supra-essential to ontic

Being is the (self-)analysis of a henad. For Proclus, this is a product distinct from the henad and dependent…

For Damascius, it is henadic as well. This means that there is no transition to Being in the sense there is for Proclus.

This is the most important structural innovation of Damascius. I think that it may the systemic consequence of his "Ineffable"

This link is what I am trying especially to think through as I read.

It is perhaps that there is no closure in analysis of the henad, therefore the analysis itself is merely another mythic action.

Note, in this respect, that Damascius carries the mythological exegesis all the way up into the Intelligible Gods, unlike Proclus.

For Proclus, the mythological exegesis has to begin from acts BETWEEN Gods: the first in Hellenic theology for him is Phanes being seen.

Phanes = Third Intelligible Triad/Intelligible Intellect/the Paradigm/Animal Itself

Second Intelligible Triad = The God in space/place

First Intelligible Triad = Analysis of the God

First Intelligible Triad for Proclus has no mythic expression; it is "revealed" in and through henadic causality as such, not discrete acts

But Damascius identifies the moments of the First Intelligible Triad in diverse theologies

Proclus: product of the First Intelligible Triad adequate, if inferior to henad as such; Damascius, no longer inferior & no longer adequate?

Product of First Intelligible Triad is not only Being as such, but is the root of Intellect, so what is at stake is Intellect as such

At CW I 27, Damascius begins an ascent to the First Principle "from what is [self-] evident," with the criterion being "independence"

(I think that "independent" would have been a more transparent translation of anendees than Rappe's "self-sufficient")

Damascius starts from qualified body; this is not, I would argue, because it is "what is most remote from the first principle," per Rappe

Rather, I think that it is because qualified body is "evident".

Body's dependence on quality as "an informing property" leads to some interesting remarks on substance.

As Rappe notes, for Aristotle, the genus (animal) is predicated of the species (man); for Damascius, they are mutually dependent.

This previews a characteristic of the whole ascent; D. recognizes no privilege for an informing or expressive principle, only dependence.

In this way, Damascius prepares the reader to recognize that the first principle cannot be the first principle.

"For the elements [stoicheia] always require each other, and what is composed of elements requires the elements themselves" (CW I 29)

This sense of "element", i.e., dependent moments, should be borne in mind when reading the "Elements of Theology" (Stoicheiôsis Theologikê)

The dependent parts of theology, the concepts, as opposed to the independent parts, who are real, named Gods.

This is why Proclus can use "theology" in an ersatz fashion here; normally, it refers to intact national traditions with proper names, etc.

"no surprise … that a principle should require a principle superior … but rather … if … a principle requires its consequents," (CW I 32).

The aporetic of principle as such in Damascius: upon analysis the principle always does require its consequents, so one seeks higher

In this way, the criterion of independence weakens hierarchy, makes the "higher" and "lower" dependent by that very fact

This can be seen as acknowledging the privilege of the first principle: act of the highest principle reaches furthest down.

Thus "evidence" (evident-ness) of qualified body expresses action of first principle

Dependence of the rational soul: "does not need its inferior," but "is still in need of its own activities…"

"… does not project all its activities simultaneously … projects activities which themselves undergo change."

Soul in general cannot be a principle "in the strict sense" (89, CW I 33f).

Dependence of the intellect: the "co-relatives" in intellect "require each other reciprocally," and so it has "need of itself". (90/34f)

Dependence of the intelligible: "needs the intellective, because it wishes also itself to be intellective," (90/35).

Here we see the shift in the status of intelligible, and by extension of intellect. The henad's self-analysis is a movement of *desire*.

Desire to be known; Phanes shines because desires to be *seen*; a reasonable inference, but Proclus focuses on the receiver, the witness

(i.e., Zeus). To put in strictly Platonic terms, the Paradigm "desires" to be model for the Demiurge; a life-pattern "wishes" to be chosen

Comments

Eff it

[(Anonymous)]

It's long been my goal to write an essay called "Effing the Ineffable." I suspect that if I start looking, someone must have done so already. In any case, the sort of treatment you recapitulate, viz. for handling the ineffable so that it's made virtually present, reminds me of (German) Romantic attempts to use fragmentary writing ("ruins") to present the ever-receding totality. It also puts me in mind again of your recent comments on representation/semiosis. Thanks for starting the day w/these tweets.
--KT